Tis the Season II: A Turk Reunion
by belle.nisce
Summary: [Cloud x Tifa x Reno, Tseng x Elena ] Tseng, Reno, Elena, and Rude are back at Seventh Heaven for their second holiday season, but this time, it's intentional. A holiday collection.
1. To Seventh Heaven We Go

**'TIS THE SEASON II: A TURK REUNION**

* * *

**Twenty-one days to Christmas...**  
**Title:**To Seventh Heaven We Go  
**Words:**1144  
**Summary:** The second time is _always_ better. 

It was Tifa who heard the crashing noises first. It was around two in the afternoon, and she wasn't doing anything of particular note, just cleaning a few dirty shot glasses that had been left in the sink from the night before. She was only getting round to soaping up the hot-chocolate-residue mugs from breakfast when the first bang resounded back to the bar from the white distance. Tifa paused a moment—silence (had she imagined it?) –and then squeezed a little more dish soap onto her sponge.

_Thud._

Tifa's eyes flicked up to the doorway where she had strung a string of Christmas lights the week before. All she could see was the silent inch of snow outside.

_Clank._

Marlene appeared at the top of the stairs. "Tifa, what's that?"

Before Tifa had time to respond, another noise, this time closer, made the floor vibrate a bit, and Denzel came running from the office as well. "Is the sink disposal backing up again??" he asked with a bit too much enthusiasm to be an innocent question.

Tifa shook her head. "It's from… outside, I think…." She was interrupted by the next noise, ever closer still, and Marlene ran from the stairs to join Tifa where she was now standing to face the door.

By the next ominous noise, Denzel had come to stand with the two girls, and Marlene was hugging Tifa's waist. And then Cloud poked his head in from the tool shed, where he had been oiling Fenrir.

"What's going on?" He asked, his voice slightly hoarse from being out in the cold (and from misuse, of course).

Nobody answered him. Tifa was assuming a slight defensive pose, and Cloud frowned as he saw the tense faces on all three of his family members. Wiping his greasy hands on a graying rag, he closed the side door behind him and walked over to Tifa and the two kids.

For the next moment, all they could hear was silence—and then,_vibrations, noise, more vibrations coming from just outside the door._

"What do you think it is?" Marlene whispered, her voice barely steady. She had gotten a lot braver these past few months, but she was used to the security and lull of every-day life at post-apocalyptic Midgar.

"I don't know, Marlene," Tifa said honestly, but she smoothed Marlene's hair reassuringly.

At the next boom, Denzel advised Cloud, "Maybe you should get your buster sword," but Cloud slightly shook his head, eyes narrowed, as a huge shadow suddenly loomed over their door, ominous with glowing eyes and burst the door open and—

"MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!"

And all Tifa could do was stare.

Of course, that was before they all took in the slightly out-of-breath, snow-dusted, black-suit clad foursome with red cheeks—and one, with the ever-blazing red hair as well—that was at their door laden down with a huge, prickly, pine-smelling—_was that a Christmas tree?_

Marlene screamed, shattering the silence. "You're BACK!!!!"

And before Tifa had time to think of what to even do about it, Marlene and Denzel had detached themselves from her and Cloud and were rushing over to the Turks to tackle them in bone-wrenching hugs.

"Oh my _god_, Marlene, Denzel, you've gotten so big!!!" One of them—with the blond hair, Elena—was giggling as she sized them up, gasping as she realized Denzel already reached her shoulders. "When did you grow up without me!?"

"We brought you a tree, yo," The redhead—who could forget, Reno—was gasping as he stumbled into the room and flopped onto the couch like he had lived here all along. "A goddamn Christmas tree."

"We see that," Cloud said pointedly, raising a brow.

Reno snickered, lazily raising his knight-stick for good measure and old time's sake. "Good, Strife, you're not dead yet. Gods, I need a_drink_."

And then Tseng was elbowing his way past Rude—who was left with the task of dragging the tree into the house (of course with lots of help from Denzel) scattering pine needles everywhere—and shaking Cloud's hand, then Tifa's. "My apologies for the short notice," he said, his eyes saying just the contrary. "I wanted to send warning beforehand, but these two," he gestured offhandedly at Reno, who was now twirling Marlene around to excited cries of 'Uncle Reno!!!', and Elena, who was giggling again, "insisted that we make it a surprise."

Reno added, "Yea, we're spending our break here 'stead of down south again. All I have to say is it better be worth it, yo, or I'm gone." (It was a meaningless threat.)

Tifa looked at Tseng bemusedly, still too shocked to do anything except limply shake his hand. "Th-that's okay, Tseng-san, we understa—Oh my—Tseng, is that a _ring_on your finger!?"

All activity stopped.

"Are you getting _married_, Tseng-san?" Marlene asked, atop Reno's shoulders. When Tseng didn't answer, she continued gaily, "To who, Tseng, to who?"

"To Rude," Reno answered, "They're really in love… or something."

Marlene started squealing, but Tifa cast a suspicious eye over to Elena, who was abruptly looking very shy and attempting to hide her hand underneath her gloves. She looked up at Tifa and blushed.

"Elena! Tseng!" Tifa scolded. "How could you not tell us?"

"Well, err." Tseng cleared his throat, shaking some black hair out of his eyes. "It was an impulsive decision, really. We don't even know when the wedding will be."

And as Marlene and Denzel started the old chant of 'Tseng and Elena, sitting in a tree,' (they were only children, after all), with Reno soon joining in (he had no excuse, but he was Reno), and Rude and Tseng trying to set up the tree on the stand they had brought along with them, and Elena moving the suitcases from the doorway, Tifa looked around at the scene, the mess already a forewarning of the next month to come, and then at Cloud, who was still standing still with the oily rag in his hands.

"Cloud," Tifa inquired in a low voice, "Are you all right? It's a big surprise, I know,"

She was expecting him to maybe shrug and say it was all right, to brush it off even though he really thought it was a bit of an inconvenience, but he met her gaze instead. "No, I'm fine." And then, like the whimsical, mysterious man he was, Tifa swore she saw his lips curl up in a grin as he continued, "It's funny, really. To be thinking of four people, and to have them suddenly appear at your door."

Tifa smiled. "You're right." After all, wasn't it just a moment ago that she had been reminiscing about these very people—their family—reunited, once again? She put a brief hand on his shoulder before going back to the group. "Who wants hot cocoa?"

The heavens above had a funny way of answering prayers, however unconscious they were.

_To be continued..._

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**A/N:** And it is with great happiness that I announce that I am back for more! It has been two years since the first 'Tis the Season, and I thought it was appropriate to give my readers another present for the Holidays so the first one doesn't get too recycled. If you didn't read the first 'Tis, it doesn't really matter, but it would make me happy. I expect to be doing updates at least every other day - if not every day - as a sort of countdown, all the way to Christmas. (For people who celebrate, any other Holiday, the only reason I am doing Christmas is because I don't have enough knowledge of the others to not make me look like a fool if I try to write about it.)

I'm soo excited to be back with Reno and the rest of the Turks as they crash Seventh Heaven's holiday season. (And don't you love Cloud:huggles:) I have plenty of scenarios at hand, so there will not be a shortage of inspiration on my part. I can only hope that my readers find this as nice as the first one.

So I wish you all a happy reading as we embark on this cozy journey with Final Fantasy 7 once again.

_-belle.nisce, 12.03.2007_


	2. Oh Christmas Tree

II.

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**Twenty days to Christmas…**  
**Title:** Oh Christmas Tree  
**Words:** 1115  
**Summary:** What to do when your tree is bare with everywhere to go? 

When Reno stumbled down the stairs that morning, everybody was gathered around the corner by the fireplace by the handsome pine tree. _Ah fuck, they're decorating_, Reno cursed inwardly—but as he walked over reluctantly, there didn't actually seem to be a lot of that going on.

"What's wrong?" Marlene was asking. "Where are our decorations?"

"Well, Marlene…" Tifa bent down a little so she was eye-level with the growing child. "Remember that fire we had last year? Around Christmas?"

Denzel, standing to one side looking as bored as Reno, answered the rest for her. "The tree and all the ornaments caught on fire. Did you forget already?"

Marlene stuck her tongue out at her adopted brother. "I'm just surprised_you_remember since you were so scared you tripped trying to run away and almost got _amnesia_." She turned back to Tifa, looking worried. "All the ornament stores are so far away. Are we going to have a naked tree?"

"Why not?" Denzel, apparently in one of his pre-teen surly moods, crossed his arms. Reno looked like he wanted to high-five him, and was only stopped by a stern look from Tseng.

"No, of course not," Tifa said with a smile. "We'll just have to… improvise something, that's all."

"Aww," Reno groaned, and turned to head back upstairs. "Call me when you think of something intelligent then, yo."

But Elena grabbed his arm before he could disappear. "What if we make our own? We have candy canes, and Marlene probably has colored paper."

Tifa's eyes brightened. "And we can make strings of painted nuts, and popcorn…"

Marlene clapped. "And we can cut snowflakes out of paper! I learned how in art class."

"And I have those tiny picture frames…"

Reno and Denzel looked at each other. This was turning out to be a bad sort of day.

"I changed my mind, yo," Reno announced, "I'm going to the coast."

"Take me with you?" Denzel pleaded.

---

Of course, the two, along with the three other burlier men, were made to sit down and help make the ornaments for the tree, which was quickly turning into a full-blown holiday project.

Denzel and Reno, surprise, surprise, quickly turned out to be the troublemakers of the day. Tseng took Reno aside early in the day and had some stern words with him, but all he got as a response was "whatever you say, boss-guy" and a shrug.

As it was, Denzel ruined three snowflakes in the fire, Reno sat on seven of the glass frames—which broke—and the pair of them started a popcorn-throwing fight with Rude which culminated in Tseng getting hit in the face with a fistful of kernels. When Denzel was sent to a time-out, Reno, instead of making a snowflake like he was supposed to be doing, cut Denzel a dunce cap. Denzel, in turn, splashed blue paint all over Reno's hair, ruining ten carefully painted nuts. Tifa finally had to send them behind the bar to wash the dishes instead, and even that almost erupted into a waterfight at the sink.

By six o'clock, however, after they had washed the dishes and scrubbed the bartop and all the tables and vacuumed all the pine needles from the floor and cleaned themselves up, Reno and Denzel were disgruntled and tired, and lapsed into conceding silence when Cloud handed them a string of cranberries to hang around the tree.

---

The project went far into opening time for the bar, and Tifa thought of moving it upstairs when customers started streaming in looking for drinks—but soon, they were incorporated into the tree movement, as well. After one asked what the whole ramshackle group was doing in front of the tree cutting paper and blowing up popcorn and painting nuts, word quickly spread throughout Midgar that Seventh Heaven, the best bar in town, didn't have ornaments for their tree because of the fire last year that had been started by a few out-of-towner troublemakers.

By nine o'clock that night, everyone who came through the doors of Tifa's bar was carrying one or two ornaments from their own trees at home to hang on the tree. Those who didn't have one promptly sat down to cut their own unique ornament out of the colored paper and crayons provided by Marlene.

By ten thirty, everybody in the bar was laughing and scurrying over to the tree to hang their ornaments while Reno, who had finally gotten out of decorating the "damn tree" with a promise to man the bar instead (with Elena's help to make sure he didn't poison everyone with his Grinch-like attitude), provided everybody with drinks on the house for the night.

And then, at around eleven, the old woman next door came in with her two grandchildren. They weren't alone; they were carrying a big, bright angel star holding a glowing light in her hands.

Cloud got a stepladder so the old lady could step up to the treetop to place the angel in the tree to everybody's ooh's and aah's.

The rest of the night was spent singing carols and taking pictures of and next to the now-beautiful tree and making toasts to the continual business of Seventh Heaven. Tifa noticed the old woman who had come in with the angel now sitting alone at a side table, watching her grandchildren play with Marlene and Denzel. Making sure that Reno was behaving himself at the bar, Tifa went over to join her.

The old woman smiled, and for a few moments, neither of them spoke.

Finally, the little old lady said, quietly so Tifa almost didn't hear her, "It's so beautiful."

"Oh, yes it is," Tifa nodded in agreement. "The ornaments look so pretty. Thanks for bringing over the angel; it's perfect."

The woman's eyes twinkled. "I'm not talking about the tree," she said. When Tifa raised a brow, she continued, "I'm talking about this." She gestured over to Marlene, Denzel, and the other kids, who were listening to Rude tell some story about the Turks encounter with a rabid chocobo by the fire; over to Cloud and Tseng, who had been bullied into drinking and conversing with some of the other local men at a huge table in the middle of the room and who were now laughing; over to Reno and Elena, bickering at the counter as they counted tips and playfully punched each other in the arm; then finally, over to Tifa herself.

The old woman grinned. "Beautiful," she said, and took another drink of her mead.

And Tifa felt a terribly strong sense of family; yes, she agreed silently as another wave of laughter washed over her, it was beautiful.

_To be continued..._

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**A/N:** I am so pissed off at Fanfictions little bit of 'technical trouble', you have no idea (Do you know that in summaries, you can no longer use the bracket sign!? Who would've known that the sudden absence of that little square symbol would result in such frustration?). That's partially what caused the delay, but I also had a lot of trouble with this one for some reason. I'm still not sure I'm satisfied with the way it came out; it seems a little inconsistent and too long. But I didn't want to keep you guys waiting anymore, so I just decided to post it now. Anywho, it may be subject to major format editing within the next few days until I figure out a structure I like. The message will largely stay the same, though. Other than that, thanks for the support, everyone! It's so nice to recieve such encouragement so early on in the sequel. Keep it coming; I like them :) 


	3. Angel of Assistance

III.

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**Nineteen days to Christmas...  
Title:** Angel of Assistance  
**Words:** 613  
**Summary:** Is Rude really snow-angel inspiration? 

It started when Rude, slipping on ice, fell into a particularly big snowdrift behind the bar. Marlene, watching from her window upstairs, saw the man look around him and start waving his arms and legs in a well-known holiday pattern. She called Denzel to her room.

"Denzel! Denzel, look at Rude!" She pointed. "He's making a snow angel."

"_Rude_ is making snow angels?" Denzel scrunched up his brow.

"I told you they weren't for babies. _Now_ will you go with me?" When Denzel nodded, Marlene cheered. "Come on, let's go get our coats!"

"But only for a little while, okay?" Denzel grumbled halfheartedly after his adopted sister, following her down the stairs. In all truthfulness, he had been eyeing the fresh, un-trodden snow ever since yesterday, but he would never tell Marlene that.

In the end, Marlene was so excited that he had to help her with her mittens and shoelaces, and she had bounded out the door before Denzel could even get his own hat on. By the time he made it down the back steps, Marlene had already made three.

"Don't even think you can break my record!" He challenged her, immediately flinging himself backwards and swishing his arms and legs in the shape of windshield wipers. Marlene was stenciling her initials in her third already, and Denzel was anxious to catch up. Last year, she had beaten him by two, even though he was suspicious that one of her angels was actually made by him.

"I'm winning, I'm winning," she teased in a singsong voice.

Denzel grinned, scrambling up. "Not for long!"

The two growing children were soon filling the yard with angels, some hastily made and barely resembling the shape of a heavenly being so much as a lopsided 'K', while some were beautiful in all their snow-white glory. Denzel started out attempting to keep a stoic silence like Cloud would, but after awhile, gave into shouting as loud as Marlene as they kept score.

"Twenty-six!!" He screamed, just as she whizzed by him, snow stuck to her hair.

"No fair! You're cheating! I have twenty-three!" She shrieked back happily. "Twenty-four!" Both their cheeks were flushed a ruddy red, their fingers and toes now numb.

"Rude! Come help me win!" But just as Denzel was about to throw himself down to make his snow angel number twenty-seven, he noticed something odd. "Hey… why is Rude still on his first one?"

Marlene paused. "Maybe he wants to make it extra neat?" She stood up and ran over to where Denzel was, careful to step around their angels.

Denzel craned his neck. "Maybe…" Their angel count had taken them all the way across the yard from Rude, and they could barely see him. "Do you hear something?"

Marlene frowned. "No… wait…"

And indeed, as they strained to listen, they could barely make out the bald man's deep voice drifting back in the slight breeze to their ears: "_Marlene... Denzel? I'm stuck. I can't get out... can you hear me? Reno? Boss? Cloud? Hello???"_

Denzel slid a sideways glance at the girl. "Rude's making snow angels, huh."

Marlene didn't answer to that, but tugged on his arm, Rude's shouts of getting cold growing louder by the second. "I think we'd better go get help," she said.

"_I don't want to say it, but… I really can't feel my legs." _

All jokes slid out of Denzel's head. Rude never complained unless it was serious—the last time the man had, it was because he had sliced his finger to the bone. "Yea," Denzel said hurriedly, before bolting back into Seventh Heaven, trudging on three now-forgotten angels on the way, "I think we better."

_To be continued..._

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**A/N: **Brief delay due to computer troubles and a busy winter break, sorry. Speaking of FF7, my sister gave me Advent Children on DVD for Christmas, and even though I've seen it a billion times, we watched it again today. **Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays, everyone!** I hope you had a wonderful day, and here is my humble present to you all. :)  



End file.
